


The Exchange

by ProgramasaurusRex



Category: Silicon Valley (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-31
Updated: 2017-06-25
Packaged: 2018-11-07 11:51:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 8,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11058363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProgramasaurusRex/pseuds/ProgramasaurusRex
Summary: After the cell phone debacle.





	1. Chapter 1

Gilfoyle followed Dinesh out to the garage.

"You complete asshole! I can't believe you actually fucking hit me!" said Dinesh, buzzing with adrenaline. "Like a fucking ... cartoon bully or something!"

He was too close. Gilfoyle could read every line of betrayal and hurt on his naive little face, every compressed, stifled emotion Dinesh couldn't hide anymore.

"You hit Jared," Gilfoyle pointed out.

"Yes, and I apologized," said Dinesh. "But you still started the hitting."

"You invaded my privacy," Gilfoyle snarled.

"I asked you if you minded," said Dinesh. "You said you didn't."

Gilfoyle folded his arms but made no retort.

"And you hit me from behind, too, you fucking coward!" Dinesh continued.

"Oh, you want to talk about honor?" said Gilfoyle. "I had already put my phone down. You double crossed me."

"You were all psyched to invade my inbox before Jared stopped you. You just couldn't stand anyone knowing you had a vulnerability," said Dinesh, shaking his head. "Your fucking pride was more important than my safety. You know what, why do I still talk to you? Why do I play fucking video games with you and act like it's normal that you're constantly saying racist shit and insulting me and trying to cause me pain? Every time I talk to you, I'm handing you more weapons! What the fuck is wrong with me?"

"I don't know," said Gilfoyle. "Maybe you're a masochist. Or maybe you're just a fucking moron who can't seem to get it through your head that I'm not your friend."

Dinesh looked like he wanted to cry, but would rather die than do it in front of Gilfoyle. A few times in the past, Gilfoyle had daydreamed about making Dinesh cry: how he would make it happen, where they would be, if Dinesh would burst into tears right in front of him, or if he'd make it to the privacy of his bedroom first. But now that it was imminent, Gilfoyle felt strangely uncomfortable. There was a real person in front of him, someone he knew, actually knew inside and out. There would be consequences to this fight.

In the end, Dinesh did not cry. He calmly inhaled, looked Gilfoyle in the eye, and said, "No more."

And so began three days of the silent treatment. Once he had calmed down, Gilfoyle proved to be a natural at ignoring Dinesh ignoring him. But none of the guys were fooled. A strong current of tension ran through the house.


	2. Chapter 2

The ice thawed slowly.

Jared offered the two of them an emergency peer mediation session several times, but both Dinesh and Gilfoyle ignored him. At least they agreed on something. In the end, it was Richard who stepped in.

"Richard, could you please ask Gilfoyle where he moved all the date parsing functions?" said Dinesh on the morning of Day Three.

"Okay, you know what, this is ridiculous," said Richard. "You two are adults, and you work together. This ends right now."

Dinesh sighed. "Fine. Gilfoyle?"

"They're in the abstract REST service super class, by the double parsing functions," said Gilfoyle, as if absolutely nothing was the matter. "I remember you mentioning last week that you wanted all the utility functions organized."

Dinesh scrunched up his face but ultimately just said a very spiteful, "Thank you."

Both were secretly grateful not to have to back down. And once they were talking about work again, it was difficult not to fall back into the habit of talking about other stuff. Later in the day, they got so into making fun of Jared's new vest that they very nearly buried the hatchet. But after each lapse, Dinesh got flustered and found some excuse to leave the room.

On Day Four, Gilfoyle noticed Dinesh entering the garage with an empty mug. Teatime with Jared, it would seem. Dinesh stayed for over an hour. When Jared and Dinesh came out, they both looked relaxed and happy.

Fortunately, Dinesh and Gilfoyle shared a love of computers and of their project in particular. While they may not have been getting along personally, Gilfoyle's hyper efficient memory chunk sorter and Dinesh's clean, intuitive front end design were meshing like Marvel movies and chemical engineering majors. Dinesh couldn't help but catch the others' contentment.

On the evening of Day Five, Dinesh was reading in the living room. He usually went for high fantasy, but today he had a copy of Wuthering Heights. Gilfoyle sat down in a chair and started reading a paperback. Camus' The Stranger. He watched Dinesh out of the corner of his eye.

Despite playing it cool, Gilfoyle was pretty worried about what was going to happen to his relationship with Dinesh in the long run. He wasn't sure himself why he treated Dinesh so much worse than the others. He supposed it was somehow related to the way Dinesh was always trying to present a false image of himself. To be his friend, one had to break through the image, to call him out on his bullshit time after time after time until finally Dinesh realized lying wasn't worth the effort. Gilfoyle wasn't exactly sure why it was so important to him that he reach Dinesh's real self, why he bothered to hack apart the lies, like a sea bird dropping a coconut from the sky until it finally cracked open and revealed the meat inside. But there it was inside him, the intense, almost pornographic desire to see Dinesh emotionally naked and know that he had done the stripping with his own hands.

Gilfoyle spoke and acted dishonestly sometimes himself, of course, but he did it skillfully. He had always considered himself safe from Dinesh's amateur prying. Their shared avoidance of exposure bound them together in a sense, because Gilfoyle knew exactly what it was like to misdirect out of fear. Even if he didn't share his empathy openly, Dinesh's misery felt like home to him, and unmasking him carried the novel pleasure of examining a soul like his own.

Of course, concealment was an unfortunate interest for two friends to share. Some days he almost felt too safe, almost wished that Dinesh would uncover a large enough section of Gilfoyle that he could remember what the sun felt like on his bare skin.

His cell phone, though, that had been too much. That was cheating. The thought of that much exposure all at once had filled Gilfoyle with panic.

Dinesh had been staring at the page for a long time now without turning it.

"Lost in thought?" asked Gilfoyle warmly.

Dinesh didn't answer.

Gilfoyle said, "Living with you until Pied Piper takes off is going to be a treat. How long do you think you can keep this up?"

"Until you apologize," said Dinesh. "One non-sarcastic apology. You can end this any time you want."

"What am I apologizing for exactly?" said Gilfoyle.

Dinesh crossed his legs. "Forget it. You're a dick and you always will be."

"And you think you aren't a dick?" asked Gilfoyle.

"I'm not even in the same league as you," said Dinesh. "I don't know why I didn't think of just not being friends with you sooner. I had leverage this whole time."

Gilfoyle put his feet up on the coffee table. "Oh yeah, what kind of leverage?"

"You want me to be your friend," said Dinesh. "You act like you don't, but from the moment I stopped socializing with you, you've been trying to get me to start again. All so you can have something to pull the wings off of."

"You know why you didn't think of it before?" Gilfoyle said. "Because you've never minded before. You liked it. Every time you're having a personal problem, trying to talk some woman into sleeping with you, fighting with someone in the house, who do you tell? I've never tricked you, Dinesh; you've known exactly what I was from the moment you moved in here. Face it, you wanted this."

Dinesh sat up. "You've been worse lately. Ever since I was CEO -- you felt threatened by that. I thought we would go back to normal when Richard took the chair back, but we didn't."

"Oh, I see, it was only a matter of time before we came to blows," said Gilfoyle. "You didn't hit me back, though."

"I didn't want to stoop to your level," said Dinesh.

"Right, your people invented nonviolent protest," said Gilfoyle.

Dinesh threw his hands up. "See, that right there ... Why? You know that I'm from Pakistan, and that Gandhi is from India. You're not ignorant; you're a college educated man in his thirties living in one of the most liberal cities in the world, and you say shit like that. And you're not ... you're not even actually racist, that's what makes it so stupid!"

"That's what makes it fun," said Gilfoyle. "We're doing something inappropriate together. It's a bonding thing."

"Not together," said Dinesh. "I don't do it to you."

"Feel free to start making Canadian jokes whenever you want," said Gilfoyle. "I've heard them all. Maple syrup, zambonis, politeness, apologizing ..."

"Well none of those could be said about you," said Dinesh.

"Fine," said Gilfoyle. "Look ... I'm sorry, Dinesh. I hurt you, physically and mentally, and I really do feel bad about that. But there's no way I can promise to be a nice guy in the future. I'm not a nice guy. You know that."

Dinesh sighed. "I know. I'm not either."

"So what do you want?" said Gilfoyle. 

Dinesh didn't answer.

Gilfoyle said, "I'm not being rhetorical here. Is there anything you want from me that's reasonable, that wouldn't involve me turning into a different person?"

Dinesh grinned cheekily. "What was on your phone?"


	3. Chapter 3

"That's not reasonable and you know it," said Gilfoyle.

"I guess not," Dinesh agreed. "I had to try though."

"Besides, you don't actually want to see what was on my phone," said Gilfoyle.

"Of course I do," said Dinesh.

"You want the abstract concept of victory," said Gilfoyle. "You want to put one over on me, get some dirt on me. But the actual experience of reading my entire text history, all the pictures I've taken in the past two years, all my private notes -- you're not amoral enough to enjoy that without feeling incredibly guilty. You're like a dog chasing a car."

Dinesh picked up his thumb. "Maybe not the whole thing. But I didn't just want to see it so I could have something on you."

"Why else?"

Dinesh drew up his knees. "Curiosity, to be honest. I don't know you that well," he said. "We've been roommates for years, we spent a lot of time together, but you don't talk to me about things. Not the way I talk to you."

Gilfoyle shifted in his seat. "I take an interest in your personal affairs. You don't take an interest in mine," he said, a film of bitterness coating his throat.

Dinesh wiped his forehead with the side of his hand. "Would you even let me?"

Gilfoyle curled an arm around his chest and considered the question. Under normal circumstances, he pulled away reflexively from attempts to get close to him. But there had been a few times, exceptionally rough times, when he felt that he would have sacrificed an ounce of impenetrability for an ounce of comfort. If it had been offered, that is.

"It'd be a serious risk," he said.

Dinesh met his eyes. "Gilfoyle ..." he said gently.

"Yeah?" he replied, a touch softer.

"I wouldn't tell anyone," said Dinesh, his voice very low. "Not if you came to me on your own. You've always been decent about ... there are lines you and I don't cross."

"Until last week," said Gilfoyle.

He knew why he'd said it as soon as he'd said it. He was desperate to destroy whatever tentative bond was snaking its way around the two of them. Dinesh's face registered his jab landing: with some relief, Gilfoyle noted the wide eyes and shaking hands. He had led Dinesh safely into one of their familiar squabbles.

But then Dinesh said, "I understand why you hit me now."

"You do?" said Gilfoyle.

"Yeah," said Dinesh. "Because you don't trust anyone, ever, it's your whole deal. But you still put your phone down first. And then I reminded you why you didn't trust anyone."

Gilfoyle nodded.

"I'm so sorry," said Dinesh.

A layer of bubble wrap fell from Gilfoyle's mind.

"I get why you did it," said Gilfoyle.

"Really?" said Dinesh. "Because I don't."

"It's not rocket science," said Gilfoyle. "You wanted to hurt me."

Dinesh did not reply, just put his hands over his face.

"Oh, you thought we were just going to sweep that under the rug?" said Gilfoyle. "You looked at my files because you wanted to hurt me. I hit you because I wanted to hurt you back. You forget that I know you. There is selfishness inside you, Dinesh; I see it. There's malice, too. You resent me, fear me, frequently wish I'd get run over by a semi."

Dinesh was breathing deeply, as if trying to calm himself. And then he did. And then he replied, "Not right now."

"Why?" Gilfoyle burst out. "Everyone hates me! I've gone out of my way to make you hate me in particular! What possible positive feeling could you possess for me after all of the horse shit I've heaped on you from the day we met?"

Dinesh shivered. "You're right, Gilfoyle. I have a lot of hate inside me. I've spent my whole life trying to hide it, rationalize it, push it down, make excuses for it. And then I met you. And you ... you wore your hate on the outside, right where everybody could see it. And at first it was so easy to hate you back; there was so much to object to. But then one day I realized: you are so over-the-top evil that I have no reason to hide myself from you. You are the only person in my life I can actually allow to see me."

Gilfoyle had leaned forward without realizing it. "Yeah?" he said.

Dinesh blinked at him. "Yeah," he said, blinking, blinking, eyes snapping shut. "It's just frustrating that the person who knows me best in the world can't stand me."

He started to stand up, but Gilfoyle stopped him with a firm hand. It was a reflex, but once he'd done it, it felt right.

This wasn't a game anymore. He couldn't snark his way out of this one. He could either let Dinesh think what he had just said was the truth, putting a wall between them once and for all. Or, he could speak his mind.

Conversely, he could do what his body had already decided for him and pull Dinesh into a kiss.


	4. Chapter 4

The good news was that Gilfoyle thoroughly enjoyed the kiss. The smell of Dinesh, the feel of soft hair beneath Gilfoyle's fingers, the curve of tense shoulders beneath a polo shirt beneath Gilfoyle's left arm, the little snort of surprise, all turned out better than expected. He wondered if Dinesh liked it, too.

The bad news was that he was absolutely fucked now.

Gilfoyle told himself not to run away. He had to stay here and face this. He had to control the damage, spin it okay somehow. If he ran away now, Dinesh would come to his own conclusions. Automatically, he pulled on a nonchalant smirk before the kiss even ended.

"What the hell was that?" said Dinesh.

Gilfoyle sat back down. "Maybe you've never been on the receiving end of one, but that was a sexual advance."

But his voice wasn't coming out right; the words were normal, but the sound and the pace of him gave Gilfoyle away. 

"Was it?" said Dinesh. "Or was it some weird power move?"

Gilfoyle didn't know the answer at first, but when he stopped to think for a moment, it was obvious. He had a crush on Dinesh. He honestly hadn't realized before. But suddenly he could see that the word fitted everything he felt about his friend.

"I feel like my actions were pretty self explanatory," he said.

"So ..." said Dinesh. "So ..."

"Now you're getting it," said Gilfoyle.

"You're ... attracted to me?" said Dinesh.

"Enough to kiss you," he replied.

"So you're ... you expect me to believe you are romantically interested in me," said Dinesh.

"Maybe," said Gilfoyle, who was trying very hard to keep still even though his whole body wanted to twitch. "Sometimes making out is about romance; sometimes it isn't."

"But ... why ... why now?" asked Dinesh.

"I don't know," said Gilfoyle, unable to keep his breath from shortening, his traitorous pulse from speeding up, his voice rising in pitch, words tumbling out like they were the boss of him. "I didn't really plan it. It seemed like a natural climax to the conversation we were having. You expressed doubt about my feelings toward you, and kissing you was the most efficient way to let you know they were unfounded."

Miraculously, Dinesh made no move to leave. His curiosity seemed to overwhelm his discomfort. "You couldn't have just said 'hey, you're a pretty cool guy' or something?"

"I have a reputation for extreme sarcasm," said Gilfoyle. "I didn't want you to doubt my meaning."

"Oh, right, because kissing me definitely cleared up any confusion I might have," said Dinesh.

Jian Yang chose this exact moment to walk into the living room with his cup of coffee. Shit! He didn't seem surprised to see them talking together or at all interested in their conversation, so perhaps he hadn't heard anything. But Gilfoyle wasn't comfortable with how they must look. Wordlessly, Dinesh and Gilfoyle decided to retreat to Dinesh's bedroom to discuss the matter further.

"Dinesh, here it is," said Gilfoyle, perched on the end of Dinesh's bed. "I feel ... a great deal of affection for you. Is that clear enough?"

"No it is not," said Dinesh. "Why do you treat me the way you do then?"

Gilfoyle looked down, sweating bullets. "Because I don't want to feel a great deal of affection for you if you feel nothing for me."

"Who says I feel nothing for you?" said Dinesh.

"Well," said Gilfoyle gruffly, "now that I know affection might not be unwelcome, maybe I won't treat you that way anymore."

Dinesh sat silently, letting the hint hang between them.

"So ..." said Gilfoyle, tapping his foot on the side of the bed frame, "Thoughts?"

"I don't know," said Dinesh. "An hour ago I had no idea kissing you was an option. I'm not sure how I feel about it."

"You don't have to decide right now," said Gilfoyle, although he desperately hoped Dinesh would decide right now.

"I mean, I do like you," said Dinesh. "But I don't know if I like you romantically. Maybe we should think about being friends that actually trust each other first."

"Good point," said Gilfoyle, trying not to act too disappointed. "Are you at least ... open to liking another guy that way?"

"I am," said Dinesh.

It was Gilfoyle's turn to be stunned."Really?"

"Thought you were going to have to drag that one out of me, didn't you?" said Dinesh. "No, I've known I was bisexual for a few years now. I was worried about you finding out before, but under the circumstances you might as well know."

"So are you attracted to me or not?" asked Gilfoyle.

Dinesh held out his palms. "I've never actually done anything with a guy, so I'm not sure what it's supposed to feel like. I know that I like to be near you, and if we're on opposite sides of the room, I tend to end up next to you. So, mentally, I guess I am. But physically, I have no idea. You look okay, but I've ... sort of trained myself to ignore men's bodies, if that makes sense."

"Okay, but, gut feeling, yes or no?" Gilfoyle sputtered.

Dinesh chuckled. "Well somebody's anxious!"

"Of course I'm fucking anxious!" said Gilfoyle. "How the fuck are you not right now?"

Dinesh raised a shoulder. "Well, I'm holding all the cards. I'm a little giddy right now actually."

"Glad you're enjoying this," said Gilfoyle.

"Shouldn't it make you happy that I'm happy?" said Dinesh. "If you really do feel ... that way about me."

"It is nice to see you with something to be confident about," said Gilfoyle. "But I'm a little too worried to be happy for you at the moment."

Dinesh put a hand on Gilfoyle. "Don't be," he said. "I'm not going to stop being friends with you either way."

"If we're friends now, that is," said Gilfoyle.

"We both want to be," said Dinesh. "That's a start."

"But you need us to have trust," said Gilfoyle. "I understand that."

"What if we ..." said Dinesh. "What if we just traded secrets back and forth until we were close? Like, a secret every day, or every week? We could order all of our secrets smallest to largest, and then by the time we got to the end of the list, we'd be ..."

"How would we judge that the secrets were of comparable magnitude?" said Gilfoyle. "You could just make up a bunch of stupid ones."

"Maybe we'd each have to agree that we'd received an acceptable secret before we advanced to the next iteration of the loop," said Dinesh.

"What if we have a security breach?" said Gilfoyle. "Would we have to start over?"

"I don't know," said Dinesh. "That person would have to make up for it somehow."

They were on familiar ground now, discussing the nuances of algorithm production.

"Well, we are two of the brightest engineers in the valley," said Gilfoyle. "I'm sure we'll be able to figure it out."

"Did you just tell me I'm bright?" said Dinesh.

Gilfoyle laughed. "That's what you're shocked by?"

Dinesh smiled. "I can see this will take some getting used to."


	5. Chapter 5

The next morning, Gilfoyle woke up long before his alarm and lay back in his bed, trying to make sense of things. He was still dealing with the relatively new idea that he wanted Dinesh. As a sexual partner? As a boyfriend? The conclusion he had come to the night before was: probably as a boyfriend. He could see now that he had been trying desperately to get Dinesh's attention for a very long time, and this was why.

His interest was not primarily rooted in how Dinesh looked. In fact, Gilfoyle hadn't had much sexual experience with men beyond kissing and a little groping. For a hedonist, he had a pretty low sex drive. So he wasn't sure what he wanted to do with Dinesh exactly, except that he wanted him at his disposal. He tried to imagine himself naked with Dinesh, sprawled out on the bed, touching him wherever he liked, holding him full length face to face, or maybe from behind, visions near to innocent but awash with closeness. He felt himself getting hard. No, there had been no mistake. If the prospect of humbling himself enough to share his sexual ignorance felt daunting, well, at least they would be in the same boat. 

The symmetry of a relationship with another man appealed to him. He had seen through a crack last night, seen a possibility of having a real conversation with Dinesh, his equal, a man who shared enough of his emotional DNA that it almost felt indecent to consider forming an intimate bond with him. He ought to feel about ten times more paranoid and cautious than he did, but he couldn't seem to manage it. Dinesh was curious about him; Dinesh wanted to know his secrets; Dinesh had noticed that Gilfoyle didn't confide in him and expressed a desire to change that. Everything else could go fuck itself; all of Gilfoyle's walls could be brought down with the flick of a remote control for that. The very idea had Gilfoyle shivering in his sheets.

Unfortunately, he still had a girlfriend. Kissing Dinesh was allowed under their relationship rules, but she was still technically his girlfriend, and both Tara and Dinesh would probably object to Gilfoyle trying to date both. Well, he would just have to break up with her. Their relationship at this point was a bit of a dead end. He liked her, and he liked having sex with her, and he liked having someone to talk to that didn't know any of his roommates. But he had accepted at some point that he was never going to move to Boston, and she was never going to move to San Francisco, and they were basically just killing time together as they waited for something better. Finding out she had lied about having sex with other guys for no real reason had been the final nail in the coffin. No, Tara was merely a small molehill to be swept away.

Once he accepted that his goal was to make Dinesh his boyfriend, his competitive side took over and he started plotting to make it happen. His immediate challenge right now was figuring out how to treat Dinesh during this uncomfortable waiting period. He ought to be kind, of course, because he was wooing. But not too kind, because he didn't want to ruin what was good about their relationship, and also he didn't want any of the other guys to catch on before his victory was assured and mess things up. He wouldn't be able to stand the shame if everyone knew he had an unrequited crush on his biggest rival. But he wanted Dinesh to notice that Gilfoyle had heard his complaints about hitting below the belt and taken them seriously. So today, Gilfoyle needed to hit a rather small target at the intersection of playful, affectionate, respectful, normal, and true to his own personality. And he had to do all of this while getting some serious work done.

With this in mind, he got up, walked to the kitchen, and poured himself a cup of coffee.

Jared was already awake, sipping tea and munching on a plate of apple slices. "Good morning," he said pleasantly, looking up from his crossword puzzle.

"Good morning," said Gilfoyle.

Jared smiled broadly, clearly surprised. Gilfoyle realized acting like anything other than his grumpy self would draw suspicion. But he didn't want to overact either; that was a classic rookie mistake. He decided to just pretend like he had an innocent reason for being in a good mood today. The best deceptions always involved changing as little as possible.

Inevitably, Dinesh did wake up and sit down at his work station. Gilfoyle didn't look up, but he did send Dinesh a message on PiperChat that read simply, "Act normal. We'll talk tonight."

Both of them acted as normally as they could. Just like Gilfoyle knew he would, though, Dinesh overdid it, going on a little too long about how incompetent Gilfoyle was after some minor mistake.

"Why would you mess with the constructor of one of the most important objects in the package?" he demanded loud enough for everyone in the room to hear.

"Yeah, sorry about that," said Gilfoyle. "Didn't mean to break the build. I'll just copy off that class to work on on my end and revert the original."

He wished Dinesh would tone it down. But the others just assumed Dinesh was still holding a grudge about the phone incident, or about some new incident, or nothing. None of the three would have surprised them.

Finally, the end of the day came. They headed back to Gilfoyle's room and sat down on the bed. Neither of them said anything for a minute.

"How are you doing?" Gilfoyle asked Dinesh stiffly.

"Well, I was a tiny bit distracted today," said Dinesh sarcastically.

"Same," said Gilfoyle.

"Were you?" said Dinesh. "Because you didn't seem like it. Of course, you never do. Anybody would think you just randomly kissed your friends every day."

"It's useful to be mysterious," said Gilfoyle. "At least in public. But we're in private now, so ..."

"So what?" said Dinesh. "What are the rules anymore even? Can I ask you about stuff now and you'll actually answer me?"

"Sure," said Gilfoyle.

"Well ... how are you doing?" said Dinesh.

With a start, Gilfoyle realized the rules really had changed. The main goal of his interactions with Dinesh was not scoring points anymore. He could actually tell Dinesh about what he was going through and it might even help. 

"I assure you I'm as nervous as you are," said Gilfoyle. "I've had a lot on my mind today. I've been thinking about you, and what I want to happen with you."

"Okay," said Dinesh. "And what did you come up with?"

"I'd like to be as close to you as I can be," said Gilfoyle. "I can't be close to you without your permission, though. So for now I just want to make you feel comfortable with me."

"I'd like to feel comfortable with you," said Dinesh. "I've always been a little afraid of you, but when we're getting along, it's nice. If it could be like that all the time ... I don't know. It's hard to imagine, you not trying to attack me all the time."

Gilfoyle grew warm around the ears. Honestly, he had rarely considered the possibility that he was doing real damage to Dinesh with his insults. It had always seemed like a game to pass the time, friendly, welcome even. But he saw now that it deterred Dinesh from speaking up when he had something risky to say.

"I might still mess with you sometimes," said Gilfoyle, eyes warm. "But I'll stop if you ask me to."

"Yeah, I can't imagine you ever giving that up completely," said Dinesh. "So ... what do you think about my algorithm idea?"

"I'm up for it," said Gilfoyle.

"Right now?" said Dinesh.

"Sure," said Gilfoyle. "In fact I'll go first. Ready?"

"Oh. I hadn't picked a secret yet," said Dinesh.

"That's okay," said Gilfoyle. "You can go later."

"Okay," said Dinesh. "Then I can pick something about the same size."

"That sounds good," said Gilfoyle. "Well anyway ... I write poetry."

He held his breath a little as he waited for Dinesh to respond.

"Really?" said Dinesh.

"Yeah," said Gilfoyle. "That's one of the things I didn't want you to see on my phone. I'm not actually going to show you any yet, but I figured the fact that it exists is something."

"Fair enough, that's pretty interesting," said Dinesh. "What's it about?"

Gilfoyle shrugged. "Sometimes it's about my anarchist politics. Sometimes it's just regular angsty feelings shit."

"Cool," said Dinesh uncertainly.

"Cool?" asked Gilfoyle.

"I mean ..." said Dinesh. "Obviously ... that's something I would make fun of you for usually, so it definitely qualifies. But I guess now I can't."

"You still can," said Gilfoyle. "But I told you on purpose, so it's not very good as ammunition. Now it's just a joke that we're both in on." 

Dinesh considered this for a moment.

"So," said Gilfoyle gently. "What have you been afraid I'd find out?"

"Uh ..." said Dinesh. "I'm on medication for insomnia and anxiety."

Gilfoyle snorted. "You live in California. Everybody's on some kind of medication."

"Are you?" said Dinesh.

"I've been on depression meds since high school," said Gilfoyle.

"Oh ... I guess that makes sense," said Dinesh. "I guess that's two for you then. Do you want another from me?"

"Your preoccupation with fairness amuses me," said Gilfoyle. "Sure, tell me another."

"My first job out of grad school was programming princess dress up games for Club Penguin," said Dinesh, blushing.

Gilfoyle couldn't speak for a moment. He just grinned at Dinesh. Then, he started to chuckle. He couldn't help it. At first, Dinesh started to get mad, but there was no ill will behind the chuckle. Presently, Dinesh started to laugh, too, and then they were laughing together.

"Still better than dick pics," said Gilfoyle.

"Much worse," said Dinesh. "I honestly don't know what was gayer, hundreds of actual cocks, or Prince Eric in a tutu."

Gilfoyle smiled. "I thought you liked cocks."

Dinesh tensed up. "A little," he said shyly, as if he'd momentarily forgotten that Gilfoyle knew. "There are a lot of ugly cocks in the world though. I mean, old cocks, cocks with little red bumps all over them, all sorts of weird shit."

"You'd think people wouldn't put a picture of their junk on the internet if it didn't look good," Gilfoyle mused.

"People are dumb," Dinesh said.

Gilfoyle nodded in agreement.


	6. Chapter 6

Weeks passed. Dinesh grew more comfortable, and so did Gilfoyle. This mostly took the form of them bitching a lot to each other about people they didn't like.

"Sarah tried to sell me one of those fucking handmade scarves again," said Gilfoyle one night as they lay back on his unfolded futon. "Half the church is wearing them now."

"Why do you have to go to mass to be a Satanist anyway?" asked Dinesh. "Isn't that kind of conformist for you?"

Gilfoyle shrugged. "It's something to do. You get to hang out with people who feel the same way you do about stuff."

"Well that's pretty much any group," said Dinesh.

"Being part of a group for social reasons is different from being a part of a group that tells you what to do," said Gilfoyle. "It's not like anarchists are morally opposed to softball teams and knitting circles."

"But they sort of do tell you what to do at mass, don't they?" asked Dinesh. "I mean, you read a book and it has a bunch of life rules in it."

Gilfoyle considered this. "But I chose the religion because those rules fit me. You wouldn't understand; you're not religious."

"I'm just too lazy for activities that require me to go outside that regularly," said Dinesh.

"Yeah well, it feels nice going to something where people know you," said Gilfoyle.

"Even ugly scarf Sarah?" asked Dinesh.

"Sure," said Gilfoyle. "Having one person around who is definitely more annoying than me gives me a little leeway."

"So kind of like Erlich," said Dinesh.

"Yeah," said Gilfoyle. "Erlich's our ugly scarf girl."

A little later, Dinesh fell asleep on the futon. Gilfoyle felt a sudden pang of physical desire. He wanted to touch Dinesh again, for all the most innocent reasons and a couple guilty ones, too. He lifted Dinesh's head and slid a pillow under it. But he only had one blanket. So he tried tucking it around both of them, but that felt like cheating, so he left the blanket to Dinesh and got into bed with just his sheet.

A few minutes later, Dinesh stirred.

"You were seriously going to give me your only blanket?" he asked.

Gilfoyle tried to look casual. "Canadians don't feel the cold."

Dinesh got up and brought the blanket over to Gilfoyle. "Bullshit. Here, I'll tuck you in."

At first Gilfoyle thought he was joking, but then he actually did. And it felt absurdly comfortable and relaxing and lovely. No one had ever cared for Gilfoyle like this that he could remember. He allowed himself a broad smile.

"You're actually enjoying this, aren't you?" said Dinesh, sitting down next to him.

Gilfoyle flushed but kept smiling. "Yeah," he admitted.

Dinesh looked at Gilfoyle knowingly. He seemed to understand that it was not merely the physical comfort of the warm blanket and the soft touch that Gilfoyle craved, although these helped. Half-sarcastically, Dinesh rubbed Gilfoyle's shoulder a bit. Gilfoyle closed his eyes and allowed his desire to be cared for to peek out.

And then out of nowhere, Dinesh pulled Gilfoyle into his arms. Awkwardly, without emerging from his blanket nest, Gilfoyle wrapped his arms around Dinesh as well and dropped all pretense of defending himself. It was, he decided, a fine cuddle. The sense of self consciousness and emasculation that he had always felt when Tara did nice things for him was gone. He simply enjoyed the tender strokes of Dinesh's hands in his hair, free for once. 

Dinesh checked Gilfoyle's face, as if to assure himself that he wasn't being made fun of. With all the honesty he could muster, Gilfoyle pressed his forehead to Dinesh's and looked back, agreeing with his eyes to a mutual surrender to pleasant feelings.


	7. Chapter 7

Touching is a hell of a drug, Gilfoyle observed. Once they had started, it seemed natural to continue whenever they were in private. They hadn't kissed yet, not since the first one, but it seemed like it was only a matter of time.

First, Gilfoyle had to break up with Tara.

"I'm just not feeling this anymore, babe," he told her over Skype, monotone as always.

Tara nodded. "Yeah ... I didn't want to be the one to say it, but you're right. At this point we're just, like, sunken cost fallacy."

Gilfoyle's pride had mixed feelings about this. He was selfish enough to want her to have some kind of reaction at least.

"Also I know you slept with Mason and lied about it," he said.

Tara blushed. "Bertram ... you and Mason had all that stuff between you in grad school ... I thought maybe it would do more harm than good to tell you."

"You and I had one rule," said Gilfoyle.

"I never said I didn't sleep with him, exactly," she said. "You asked what we did and I said we played chess. And we did. I beat him twice. He was so turned on he pushed the chess set off the table and mounted me."

"You deceived me," Gilfoyle said, realizing that he cared about this more than he had expected.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't think it would do any harm. I guess it doesn't really matter now."

"You're right," he said. "Because I'll probably never see you again."

He closed the window in a huff and went to find Dinesh.

"What's up?" Dinesh asked, concerned.

"Just broke up with Tara," he said.

"Oh wow," said Dinesh. "I mean ... I had assumed that would happen eventually, if you were serious about ... uh ..."

"About being with you," said Gilfoyle. "And I am."

"Holy fuck," said Dinesh. "I mean ... no one's ever done anything like that for me before."

"I didn't do it just for you; it was a bad relationship," said Gilfoyle. "Although if you want to feel flattered by it, go ahead. I could use the points."

"This is real then," said Dinesh. "It's not a joke or a game. You actually want to be in a relationship with me."

Gilfoyle put his arm around Dinesh. "It is mostly my fault that you have issues trusting my sincerity. But I really do want to be in a relationship with you, and I will wait as long as it takes for you to believe that."

Dinesh did not reply.

"Also, I know you're enjoying the attention," said Gilfoyle.

"Fuck off," said Dinesh.

"It's not a bad thing," said Gilfoyle. "You have needs and desires. And I want you to be able to be open about them with me. You like feeling pursued and wanted. Everyone does."

"Even you?" asked Dinesh.

"Of course," said Gilfoyle. "I don't like asking for it, but I still want it."

Dinesh looked closely at Gilfoyle. "Sometimes it's hard to tell. When you want things, I mean."

Gilfoyle pulled his feet up on the comforter. "You're better than most people at it. You care at least, and you notice things."

"You're important to me," said Dinesh.

A bead of sweat ran down Gilfoyle's forehead. "Am I?"

Dinesh placed a hand on Gilfoyle's chest. "You really don't know, do you? I mean how could you? I've barely mentioned it."

Gilfoyle bowed his head, but Dinesh placed a hand under his chin and pulled it back up. Then, slowly and gently, he leaned in and kissed Gilfoyle.

Nothing went wrong this time. Dinesh and Gilfoyle lay back on the bed and kissed, taking their time and exploring each other's upper halves, massaging backs and necks, twining into hair, tracing ears, well pleased. At some point Gilfoyle took Dinesh's hand and squeezed it.

"Dinesh," he said. "I've got to be honest. I know approximately fuck all about gay sex."

"Oh," said Dinesh. "Well ... I guess I just assumed you did ... but that's not a deal breaker. I guess we can just ... take off our clothes and try stuff out."

"Okay, good," said Gilfoyle. "Uh ... let's do this in stages ... maybe shirts first?" he suggested.

Dinesh reached for Gilfoyle's outer shirt. "I've had ... some dreams about this flannel," he admitted, removing the flannel and then, awkwardly, the T-shirt underneath. Gilfoyle then removed Dinesh's polo. Neither seemed to know what to do next.

"So ..." said Dinesh. "So usually at this point we go for the breasts, but we don't have breasts."

"No, right," said Gilfoyle. "Seems weird to skip this step though, so ... more kissing?"

They went back to kissing. But now Gilfoyle could feel Dinesh's bare hands on his shoulders, then on his stomach. "You have a nice body," Dinesh squeaked nervously.

"Thank you," said Gilfoyle, tracing his spine.

"I mean ... I feel kind of inadequate," said Dinesh. "You have ... abs and shit."

Gilfoyle pulled Dinesh close. "None of that," he said softly. "I wanted you, and now I've got you, and you don't know how happy that makes me."

"Okay but what if ... I mean, penises ..." said Dinesh, gesturing to their lower halves.

"Dinesh," he said. "One of us is going to have a bigger dick. It's not a big deal. I don't ... your body is good looking, but it's not the reason I want you," he said.

"Now I'm kind of freaking out about it," said Dinesh.

"Then let's not wait anymore," said Gilfoyle, unbuttoning his jeans and unzipping his pants. "Count of three?"

"Ah ... okay," said Dinesh, doing likewise. "One ... two ... three!"

They pulled down their pants. Both of them had started to get hard.

"This is so fucking weird," said Dinesh. "I'm just ... sitting here with my cock out? With you?"

"Yeah," said Gilfoyle, who was having trouble staying calm. "I get it."

"We're naked together and I actually want to get a boner?" said Dinesh.

"We haven't even gotten into tops and bottoms yet either," said Gilfoyle.

"Jesus, I can't think about that yet," said Dinesh. "Yeah, let's ease into this."

He started by touching Gilfoyle's hips and thighs, rubbing carefully up and down, making his way to the inner thighs, careful not to touch the balls or the genitals yet. Gilfoyle felt his dick hardening all the way. He wasn't used to being teased; women tended to assume you would get an erection on your own. He did the same to Dinesh but even slower, careful to keep his motions slightly different, tracing circles onto his stomach and his hips and his lower back just above his ass.

Anything you can do, I can do better.

"Wow," Dinesh whispered. "I'm ... this is a lot, Gilfoyle."

Gilfoyle removed his hands. "Do you want to stop?"

"No," Dinesh moaned. "Please touch it."

With hands of silk, Gilfoyle placed a finger on the tip of Dinesh's penis and wiggled it a bit, searching for a drop of precum.

"More!" said Dinesh. "Do the whole thing."

Gingerly, Gilfoyle let Dinesh's penis slide into his hand. He held it for a moment, leaning in to kiss Dinesh, totally unhurried. A feeling of absolute romance filled his heart, a desire to protect and spoil Dinesh as long as he was allowed. Then, he began lightly stroking the shaft.

"This is intense," said Dinesh. His hand was planted between Gilfoyle's parted thighs, motionless. "I have ... feelings ... about this ..."

"Want me to suck it?" Gilfoyle asked.

"Uh, yes ... yes ... I do want that ..." said Dinesh.

"Make yourself comfortable," said Gilfoyle. His carnal desires were heating up and he was done waiting.

Dinesh lay down, and Gilfoyle removed his pants and socks. He had a bit of difficulty figuring out how to position himself.

"Try putting your legs around mine maybe?" said Dinesh. "Okay, just let me scoot ... there."

Gilfoyle felt very cramped, hunched over Dinesh's dick, but he decided to tough it out. He licked the tip, then tried to stuff the whole thing in his mouth. It didn't fit, and it felt uncomfortable on his jaw. He decided to take it out and lick up and down Dinesh's shaft for a bit, then the head, and occasionally back into the mouth.

"Are you going to ..." said Dinesh.

"I don't know," said Gilfoyle. "This is ... more difficult than I expected. You'll see."

But Dinesh wouldn't come. He got harder and harder, and he made noises, but he didn't seem to want to ejaculate. Gilfoyle was getting exhausted.

"Is it okay?" Gilfoyle asked, very worried and insecure.

"Yeah, it feels good," said Dinesh. "I just ... I can't come in mouths."

"That's okay," said Gilfoyle, although he was disappointed. He sat down behind Dinesh and snaked one arm around his neck. With the other hand, he resumed stroking Dinesh's length. Finally, Dinesh ejaculated. Gilfoyle held him for awhile with both arms, then leaned around and kissed him.

"Uh ... success?" Dinesh said dumbly. "Let's ... do you now."

Gilfoyle sat upright on the bed as Dinesh knelt before him. Dinesh slid his mouth over Gilfoyle's dick but hesitated at about the same place Gilfoyle had. But instead of stopping, he just started sucking the part he could manage, gliding back and forth rapidly, almost overexcited. Gilfoyle tapped him on the head when he felt himself getting close, which was very soon. 

"Go ahead," said Dinesh, and resumed sucking.

Gilfoyle came. It was pretty good, but once he recovered, he felt lousy. Dinesh's smugness didn't help.

"How long are you going to gloat about being better than me at blowjobs?" Gilfoyle said, irritated.

Dinesh straddled Gilfoyle and embraced him. "You win at everything, Gilfoyle. Can you just let me have this one?"

Gilfoyle softened. "Sure. It was a nice blowjob, honey."

Dinesh kissed him. "You too though. I like a long one."

"You sure?" said Gilfoyle.

"I'm ... weird," said Dinesh.

Gilfoyle pulled Dinesh into a spoon. He could not believe they were doing this, bodies all the way flush, relaxing under a bedspread grown warm from their shared heat.

"I liked doing that with you," said Dinesh sleepily. "Let's do that more."

Gilfoyle slid his hand down Dinesh's arm, feeling that all of this had been worth it.


	8. Chapter 8

Up until now, Gilfoyle hadn't given much thought to what would happen if he actually managed to win Dinesh's heart. But now that he had, they were going to have to tell everyone.

"I think it's time we ripped off the bandaid," said Gilfoyle. "Let's do it this morning."

Dinesh shivered. But deep down Gilfoyle knew Dinesh wasn't afraid of anyone but him. "It would be nice to be able to touch you whenever I want," Dinesh said.

Together, they left Dinesh's room.

"Hey guys, we're dating now," said Gilfoyle, taking Dinesh's hand.

All of them looked incredibly surprised, except Jian Yang who didn't seem to care much. Slowly they started to realized Gilfoyle was serious.

"You're both gay?" Richard sputtered.

"Bisexual, if you please," said Gilfoyle.

"And ... and you actually like each other?" Richard asked.

"Well that much was apparent," said Jared. "But I must admit the sexual component surprises me. I suppose there's a thin line between love and hate. Well ... congratulations!"

"Please," said Erlich. "It's the twenty-first century. Everybody who's anybody experiments."

Richard continued to ask about five or six more boring questions. But they'd done it. They were out of the closet.

Everything went pretty uphill from there. Gilfoyle was amazed at how nice it felt to be openly dating Dinesh, to have somebody who liked him around all day. Little things like a touch on the shoulder or a smile across the counter brightened up his day every time.

His favorite new activity was sleeping next to Dinesh. Well, he supposed, he was unconscious for that part. More accurately, it was climbing into bed with Dinesh, cuddling up, kissing him goodnight, exchanging a few last minute bits of conversation about the day, and drifting off to sleep with a warm, good smelling boyfriend beside him. In bed, they had no responsibilities or egos or social obligations to keep up. They just rested, and to share that rest with Dinesh felt terrific.

"Cozy?" asked Dinesh, touching his neck.

Gilfoyle made a noise he couldn't remember ever having made before to indicate his contentment.

"I like this," said Dinesh.

"Yeah, I like it too," said Gilfoyle.

A few minutes later, Gilfoyle's phone buzzed. He was playing little spoon tonight, so Dinesh was on the outside near the night stand.

"Can you check who's texting me?" Gilfoyle asked sleepily.

Dinesh smirked. "Oh, now I can look at your phone?"

Gilfoyle smiled. "Yeah, knock yourself out."

Dinesh rolled over and checked Gilfoyle's phone. "It's Edward Snowden. He wants you to hack the Pentagon for him."

Gilfoyle rolled over and gave Dinesh a little swat.

"Seriously though, it's from Tara. She says next month she's going to be in town with some guy named Mason?"

Gilfoyle snorted, pulling Dinesh into a very serious snuggle. "Tell her to fuck off. I've got plans with my boyfriend."


End file.
